With Rob Bartel leaving BioWare/EA now, it really means the end of an era is reached for me. I wonder if there is anybody left that worked on all the great BioWare RPGs? I guess David Gaider is still there.

I can't believe how much time I spent on NWN, playing the mediocre ofiicial campaign, but then the amazing modules released by fans. I even tinkered for hours upon hours with the toolset myself.

Are there any other games currently in development with the same scope as these RPG masterpieces from the "old" BioWare?

Originally posted by tuppe99

With Rob Bartel leaving BioWare/EA now, it really means the end of an era is reached for me. I wonder if there is anybody left that worked on all the great BioWare RPGs? I guess David Gaider is still there.

I can't believe how much time I spent on NWN, playing the mediocre ofiicial campaign, but then the amazing modules released by fans. I even tinkered for hours upon hours with the toolset myself.

Are there any other games currently in development with the same scope as these RPG masterpieces from the "old" BioWare?

Not to bum on you, but you pointed out the official campaign was mediocre and it was the player-made mods that were amazing. While, yes, they provided the toolset, it was really the players that made the Neverwinter games interesting, that's the generally accepted consensus (one I agree with). In other words, Bioware aren't the ones you miss, so that many of the original people are leaving isn't that sad.

For me, there are plenty of games that measure up if not flat out surpass Bioware's storytelling, including some of the older games. Don't get me wrong, I loved them too, and I like-ish Bioware even if they've done nothing but trip up lately. But they're often touted as the creme de la creme of storytelling, and I think that's if anything due to some false sense of allegiance players feel to specific devs than the dev's actual ability to tell a story, whether adequate or not.

As for suggestions, in MMO form, both GW2 and TSW tell great stories. In terms of sRPGs, if you're not particular about the game being specifically an RPG and/or setting, check out free-roaming games like Infamous and Assassin's Creed, while also keeping a lookout for two upcoming games: The Last Of Us, and Beyond: Two Souls. If you need it in RPG form, Dragon's Dogma had a great storyline even if the companions got a little annoying after a while, and Skyrim's storyline is debateable but its modding community allows for the same storytelling that the NWN games offered through modules. Darksiders had very 'meh' gameplay, but the storyline was interesting and the characters were developed well, and Darksiders 2 is looking to be the same. From Bioware, ME3 now officially gets my vote after the recent ending patch, which basically brings the final moments of the game up to the standard it always should have been and adds replay value as well, and supposedly they're going in a new direction with Dragon Age 3 after the criticism of DA2, attempting a more open-world approach this time while going back to the DA:O charm that people loved in the first place. Whether or not they live up to that remains to be seen, but they're trying. That, supposedly, is due out somewhere between next year and 2014 though, so it's a bit into the future.

i remember playing this game for a while. it was cool. its funny such a sandboxy company ended up making the most linear single player game to date. interestingly the game that stopped me playing nwn was sim city 4. also bought by ea. suffered a simlar fate as well.

Originally posted by drakaena
NWN might have been the most fun I've ever had in a video game. Right up there with FF7.

At least in a RPG, yes. 

I actually really enjoyed the combined SoU/HotU campaign.  I had even written maybe 30 pages of fanfic about a characters's adventures with his loyal kobold companion.  For folks interested in the Forgotten Realms setting with a good imagination I think both the OC and SoU/HotU campaigns actually had a lot more to offer than it seemed on the surface.

One of the hallmarks of "vintage Bioware" really was being able to play the game the way you wanted to play.  The Infinity and Aurora Engines were extremely mod friendly and Bioware not only encouraged but actually embraced the idea of players playing their games in different ways.  There was none of this talk about the "right" way to play or "You can't talk about that here because that's not how it was intended."  Bioware provided a foundation, and then let players build upon it.   They were, back in those days, everything right about PC gaming IMO.

What im wondering is with all the staff layoffs going on with bioware of staff associated with SWTOR and talk of it eventually going free to play could this be a slippery downward slope for the game and it going the saem way as star war galaxys?  Though ive never never had the chance to play star war galaxy's before it shut down I have heard a lot of good things about it